National Organization for Marriage was a participant or observer in the following events:

An image of Dede Scozzafava, altered by a conservative activist to make her appear as Revolutionary War traitor Benedict Arnold. [Source: Saberpoint (.com)]Democratic candidate Bill Owens wins an unexpected, narrow victory in a special election for the US House seat representing New York State’s 23rd District, a win widely seen as a setback to the national tea party movement. Owens ran against Conservative Party candidate Douglas L. Hoffman in a race that saw the original Republican Party candidate, Dede Scozzafava, drop out under heavy pressure from local, state, and national tea party organizations to give way to Hoffman, their preferred candidate. Scozzafava was the unanimous choice of the 11 county chairs of the district’s Republican Party organization. The 23rd District is traditionally Republican. Conservative figures identified with the tea party, such as former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin and Governor Tim Pawlenty (R-MN), who has presidential aspirations, came out strongly in favor of Hoffman and against Scozzafava, as did talk show hosts Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh, and Fred Thompson, and the editorial pages of the Weekly Standard and the Wall Street Journal. Scozzafava is a moderate Republican who supports gay and abortion rights, and the federal economic stimulus package promoted by the Bush and Obama administrations. The Republican National Committee (RNC), which had backed Scozzafava, applauded her decision to withdraw and endorsed Hoffman. Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-GA), who like the RNC had supported Scozzzafava but in the days before the election endorsed Hoffman, says he worries that having third-party candidates routinely enter races would split conservative votes and give Democrats control of federal and state governments. “This makes life more complicated from the standpoint of this,” he says.“If we get into a cycle where every time one side loses, they run a third-party candidate, we’ll make [Nancy] Pelosi [D-CA] speaker for life and guarantee [President] Obama’s re-election.… I think we are going to get into a very difficult environment around the country if suddenly conservative leaders decide they are going to anoint people without regard to local primaries and local choices.” After Hoffman’s loss, some tea party figures blame the Republican Party for the defeat, saying that if the party had gotten behind Hoffman from the outset, he would have defeated Owens. Fox News commentator Mike Huckabee, the former governor of Arkansas, agrees, saying: “I think Doug Hoffman likely would have won if he had been the Republican candidate from the get-go. It wasn’t a spike in the end zone for the Democrats. They got that seat not because Democrats were brilliant, but because Republicans were stupid.” Some conservatives attempt to frame the loss as a victory because they forced the more moderate Scozzafava out of the race. Brian Brown of the National Organization for Marriage (NOM) says, “Our number one goal was to make clear that the Republican Party cannot take someone as liberal as Dede Scozzafava and thrust her out on the voters and expect the voters just to accept it.” The seat became vacant after Representative John M. McHugh (R-NY) was appointed by President Obama to become secretary of the Army. After facing a barrage of heavy criticism from Limbaugh, Palin, and the like, Scozzafava abruptly withdrew from the race and threw her support to Owens. Some critics questioned Hoffman’s eligibility to run for the seat, noting that his home in Lake Placid, New York, is not in the district. The conservative Club for Growth spent $1 million promoting Hoffman’s candidacy, and other conservative organizations such as the anti-abortion Susan B. Anthony List and NOM also supported Hoffman. The groups funneled cash into Hoffman’s campaigns, printed up literature, and sent volunteers from other areas in the country to work for Hoffman. Dick Armey, the former House majority leader who now heads the conservative lobbying group FreedomWorks (see February 16-17, 2009, February 19, 2009 and After, February 27, 2009, March 2, 2009, March 13, 2009 and After, April 14, 2009, and April 15, 2009), says the race proves Republicans need to stop fielding moderate candidates. “My own view right now is the myth that you have to be a moderate—a Democrat lite—to win in the Northeast probably has less standing now than in any time since I’ve been in politics,” Armey says. “The small-government candidate in the Republican Party—or running as an independent—is going to be the one to draw the energy of these voters.” Marilyn Musgrave, a former representative from Colorado who works for the Anthony List, says after the election that the conservative backing of Hoffman proves to Washington lawmakers that they should not take conservative votes for granted. “Don’t just assume we’re yours,” she says. [Christian Science Monitor, 10/29/2009; New York Times, 10/31/2009; New York Times, 11/3/2009]

The US Court of Appeals for the First Circuit issues a pair of rulings in two related cases that affirm campaign finance disclosure provisions in Maine and Rhode Island. Both cases were brought by the National Organization for Marriage (NOM), a conservative group that opposes, among other things, state and federal laws granting gays and lesbians the right to marry. The Citizens United ruling (see January 21, 2010) allows for unlimited donations from corporations and labor unions, but also upholds disclosure laws that can be “justified based on a governmental interest in ‘provid[ing] the electorate with information’ about the sources of election-related spending.” NOM’s pair of lawsuits challenged those areas of campaign finance laws in the two states, asking that NOM’s donors be allowed to remain secret. The court denies the lawsuits, writing in part: “In an age characterized by the rapid multiplication of media outlets and the rise of internet reporting, the ‘marketplace of ideas’ has become flooded with a profusion of information and political messages. Citizens rely ever more on a message’s source as a proxy for reliability and a barometer of political spin. Disclosing the identity and constituency of a speaker engaged in political speech thus ‘enables the electorate to make informed decisions and give proper weight to different speakers and messages.‘… Additionally, in the case of corporate or organizational speakers, disclosure allows shareholders and members to ‘hold them accountable for their positions.‘… In short, ‘the First Amendment protects political speech; and disclosure permits citizens and shareholders to react to that speech in a proper way.’” Unless the appellate court’s decisions are overturned, the two states’ campaign disclosure statutes will remain in effect. NOM attorney James Bopp used a number of arguments in court that legal analyst Ian Millhiser will characterize as “paranoid fantasies regarding the impact of disclosure laws,” such as the need for anti-gay groups to keep their donors secret to protect those donors from harassment and threats. Industry groups have argued that government officials intend to use disclosure laws to reward their political allies. Millhiser will observe sardonically, “Because there is nothing dirtier than requiring wealthy individuals and corporations to come out from the shadows and reveal which elections they want to buy.” Similar lawsuits against campaign disclosure laws in Florida and New York, which Millhiser will say are the product of a “coordinated campaign” against disclosure, are pending. A lower court dismissed the New York case, and that decision is in the process of being appealed. [NATIONAL ORGANIZATION FOR MARRIAGE et al v. WALTER F. MCKEE et al, 8/11/2011; NATIONAL ORGANIZATION FOR MARRIAGE v. JOHN DALUZ, 8/11/2011; Policy Shop, 8/16/2011; Think Progress, 8/17/2011] Shortly after the Citizens United ruling, Bopp confirmed that this case, like the Citizens United case and others (see Mid-2004 and After), is part of a long-term strategy to completely dismantle campaign finance law (see January 25, 2010).

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